Beaded stem stitch

Stem stitch is probably one of my favourite bead embroidery stitches, which is kind of fun considering how long I spent disliking this stitch as a kid. Of cause, back then I stitched on with embroidery floss and my dislike came from a child's impatience and lack of skill in making small and even stitches. When I rediscovered embroidery again, I thought I'd give it a new go eventhough I remembered how difficult I found the stitch as a kid. But once I began stitching, I realised that i's a very easy and pretty stitch! It wasn't as tricky to get even as I remembered!

And then this year, I tested to bead it too. All of this, you can see and read about in the TAST catch-up post. This above is my latest sample that I did for a post on my other blog.

At the top is a row of stem stitches that I made just as a comparison: stem stitch with floss looks in many ways different from beaded stem stitch. Below that is a row made with beads in one colour. Stitched from right to left and as you can see it was first at the end I remembered that in order to get a straight end, you need to begin and end with a half stitch. Which I did in the next row where I also used two different colours in order to get an illusion of a twisted cord.

The last row is more experimental and not really something I'd recommed for stem stitch unless you opt for the wider type of stem stitch that's more like diagonal satin stitch. If using stem stitch and stitchin in a straight row, the bugle beads will be pushed away from the point where the floss is stitched through the cloth and be exposed.

I also tried another version that failed miserably, but which I might as well show. Trying to mix bugle beads and seeds wasn't such a bright idea. Looked better in my head that on cloth. (I did this before the bugle bead row in the above sample, by the way. Just bugles actually worked better in my eyes.)